Hawk Calls and Sounds: Identification Guide
Hawk calls range from the red-tailed hawk’s iconic descending scream to the sharper, repeated calls of red-shouldered hawks and forest-hunting accipiters.
Every guide on The Faunalist in one archive. Browse identification help, species profiles, feeding advice, and regional birding guides for North American backyards.
Hawk calls range from the red-tailed hawk’s iconic descending scream to the sharper, repeated calls of red-shouldered hawks and forest-hunting accipiters.
Hawks at bird feeders are hunting the songbirds a feeder attracts. Here is how to make the area less appealing to hawks without breaking the law.
Hawks are carnivorous hunters that eat small mammals, birds, reptiles, and insects, though exact prey varies widely by species and habitat.
Birds of prey fall into six main groups: hawks, eagles, owls, falcons, vultures, and kites or harriers, each built for a different hunting style.
The red-tailed hawk and red-shouldered hawk are both common buteos, but size, color, tail pattern, habitat, and call all set them apart.
The White-Tailed Hawk is a striking, pale-headed buteo of the coastal prairies, found in the United States almost exclusively in South Texas.
The most common small birds you’ll see in a US backyard, grouped by color and shape, with the key field marks that make each one identifiable.
Swainson’s Hawk breeds across the open prairies of the American West and undertakes one of the longest migrations of any North American raptor, wintering deep in South America.
How to identify a gray catbird, why it makes a call that sounds exactly like a cat, and what its impressive vocal mimicry involves.
The Ferruginous Hawk is the largest hawk in North America, a rust and white giant of the open western grasslands that specializes in hunting ground squirrels and prairie dogs.